1850 American Gold Tycoon

The last time Liang Yao came to Nanfang State was in June 1851.

And at that time, Liang Yao went to Texas, a new southern state that had just been incorporated into the United States. Texas at that time was not a very typical southern state.

This is the first time Liang Yao has come to Virginia, the home base of the Dixie Gang: the most developed state in the South.

Although Virginia is the most populous state in the South, Virginia does not have any large cities with a population of more than 50,000.

The largest city in Virginia is the state capital, Richmond. Richmond is not only the political center of Virginia, but also the economic and cultural center of Virginia.

The integration of three centers into one is a relatively rare phenomenon among American states.

Richmond is very close to Washington, only more than 150 kilometers away, and it only takes five or six hours by train.

By the mid-19th century, Richmond was a large city with a population of nearly 40,000.

However, the southern slave-holding states during this period did not include black slaves as a population in statistics. Blacks in slave-holding states were included in statistics in the form of property.

If black people are included, Richmond's population may be 60,000 to 70,000.

Of course, "big city" here is a relative term, limited to Virginia, and Richmond is a big city.

Not to mention looking at the whole country, even in the South, Richmond is not an absolutely populous city in the South. It does not even have a fraction of the population of New Orleans.

New Orleans' strategic location at the mouth of the Mississippi River made it an important intersection for goods and people. This allowed New Orleans to rapidly develop into the largest port city in the South.

During this period, the population of New Orleans reached about 170,000, making it the largest city in the South. Including black slaves, the actual population of New Orleans is likely to have exceeded 200,000.

At the invitation of Robert E. Lee, Liang Yao took his own special train to Virginia after leaving Washington. This time his destination was Richmond, the capital of Virginia.

The train rolled into the quiet countryside of Virginia, puffing up smoke and making a shrill roar of steam.

"I prefer the south to the north, which looks more pastoral."

Shen Baozhen admired the endless plantations beside the railway, and the pastoral scenery along the way made him feel happy.

Compared to the smoky and filthy north. The scenery here is much more pleasing to the eye: the sky is clear and the air is clear, the river is clean, and what comes into view are either fields or patches of woods.

"It seems that Brother Shen still prefers an idyllic life." Liang Yao closed the "Principles of Political Economy and Taxation" in his hand.

The original classical economics texts are difficult to understand and require multiple readings to gain a general understanding.

Liang Yao usually chooses to read these boring and obscure works to pass the time while riding the train. Of course, most of the time it has the effect of helping him sleep.

"Who doesn't yearn for such magical days?" Shen Baozhen pointed out the window and said.

"In my opinion, the South is not as bad as what the wise brother said in "The Universal Mirror of All Nations"."

Shen Baozhen has read the book "Tongjian of All Nations" several times. Although the United States is not the first Western country introduced in this book, it is the Western country introduced in the most detail.

Shen Baozhen clearly remembers that when Liang Yao introduced the United States in his book, he specially divided it into the north and the south.

In the book, Liang Yao described the south in a very bad way.

It was February, and Virginia's tobacco, corn, and cotton plantations had not yet entered the planting season.

Therefore, the plantation Shen Baozhen saw was not very populated. Along the way, he only saw a few scattered black slaves leveling the land, and a few white people checking the condition of the drainage system and irrigation facilities.

"It looks like a ridge from the side and a peak from the side, with different heights from near to far." Liang Yao said, "Li Taibai still couldn't see the true face of Mount Lushan clearly. We were in a closed train carriage, separated by a layer of glass. How dare you say you can see the true face of this state?"

While talking, the train passed through a winter wheat field, and several strong black stewards and overseers were seen waving their whips and shouting loudly, driving a group of shackled, skinny black slaves into the wheat field to remove insects and clean up the wheat field.

Liang Yao vaguely remembered that the last time he went to Texas, he did not see so many shackled black slaves.

It seems that except for the black housekeepers and supervisors responsible for management, almost all the black slaves in this wheat field, regardless of age or sex, are working in shackles.

If you look carefully, you can see white people patrolling on horses and carrying guns almost every few hundred meters.

Two of the white men were punching and kicking a black slave who was trying to escape.

It seems that due to the northern propaganda offensive, the phenomenon of escaped slaves in the south has become more and more serious.

Black slaves were also divided into three, six or nine grades.

The first class is the personal servants who directly provide services to the southern manor owners, such as black housekeepers and cooks. Scarlett's fat black nurse in "Gone with the Wind" belongs to this type of high-end black slave.

These black slaves did not need to bear heavy physical labor, and the work content was relatively easy. Life was much more prosperous than that of the white Irish people who traveled across the ocean to the United States and the white workers in the factories.

Some loyal old housekeepers who were efficient and trusted by slave owners could even enjoy delicacies that even ordinary white people could not enjoy.

In order to decorate their appearance and show their wealth and kindness, slave owners would also reward these domestic servants with starched shirts, various dress skirts, ties and belts.

After all, some slave owners often took their black servants out and even traveled to Europe. If the accompanying black servants were malnourished and inappropriately dressed, the slave owners would be disgraced.

If these black stewards have children, they will also become attendants to the young slave master and become the new steward when the young master grows up.

In Liang Yao's impression, during the Battle of California Statehood, when Colonel Mason was captured, Mason's black servants were also captured, and these black servants acted as Mason's orderlies and guards. Moreover, black servants are also stronger than ordinary white soldiers, which shows that their daily living standards are no worse than ordinary white soldiers.

These black housekeepers are the easiest black people to obtain free status. The first group of free black people and even black slave owners in the United States were black housekeepers.

The next first-class black servants are gardeners, carpenters, blacksmiths and other black people who master at least one technical job.

Such black people were regarded as valuable property by slave owners, and slave owners generally did not treat them too badly. Except for some restrictions on personal freedom, their lives are not much different from those of ordinary white people.

With the lowest status and the most miserable life, the largest number of black slaves were those engaged in heavy manual labor on plantations.

This kind of black slaves is what most people in later generations remember as black slaves, and they are also the main force of escaped slaves.

White slave owners would not take human lives lightly and kill black slaves at will like in the movies. After all, black slaves were valuable property that they paid a lot of money to buy.

However, if a white slave owner or overseer saw him slacking off, he would definitely be beaten severely.

Of course, just because slave owners did not kill black slaves indiscriminately does not mean that they would not kill black slaves. If a group of black slaves disobeyed discipline, in order to tame the group of black slaves, the slave owners would tearfully kill the thorns among them to scare the monkeys and scare the monkeys. Those disobedient black slaves.

As the special train got closer and closer to Richmond, the houses and people on both sides of the railway gradually became denser. Of course, more and more black slaves could be seen.

"Brother Liang Xian, is this the southern black slave you wrote about in your book?" Shen Baozhen asked in disbelief, pointing at the black slave outside the window.

He was surprised that in the advanced Western country described by Liang Yao, there were two completely different systems in the north and the south.

"Brother Shen seems surprised?" Liang Yao said casually.

"I am greatly shocked and unbelievable. I hope brother Xian Liang can clear up my doubts for brother Yu."

Shen Baozhen had countless questions in his mind. He bowed deeply to Liang Yao, hoping that Liang Yao could answer his questions.

“From the perspective of the main participants in economic activities, there are nothing more than two ends, namely the production end of producers and the consumption end of consumers.

In classical economics, land, capital, and labor are called the three factors of production.

Among them, land and capital are real objects with clear market pricing and transaction mechanisms.

As the only living creature among the three elements, humans have the greatest uncertainties and risks. "Liang Yao explained.

After some careful thinking, Shen Baozhen seemed to understand the reasoning.

“Deprive them of their freedom, turn living people into slaves trapped in plantations, turn them into tools that can only work, and trade them at a price. In this way, the uncertainties and risks can be minimized? "

"Exactly. Although slavery is evil, from the perspective of economics and capitalists, it is a very perfect system on the production side.

In a capitalist society, the most perfect labor object is a machine that can run tirelessly around the clock, followed by slaves who do not need to be paid, and finally free labor who needs to be paid. "

Liang Yao nodded. Shen Baozhen was a smart person after all. He had a very high level of understanding and could make sense with just a few clicks.

"There are many ways to deprive people of their freedom. The black slaves you see are just deprived of their freedom in the simplest and crudest way and become slaves. Therefore, people with humanity will feel unhappy when they see it."

"So there's a way to be complicated and gentle, so that people won't feel uncomfortable seeing it?" Liang Shaoqiong on the side couldn't help but interject after listening to the conversation between the two.

"Of course there are. Workers in factories in northern states, absentees in Guangfu coal mines, and mechanics in Los Angeles refineries are essentially people who have been deprived of their freedom." Liang Yao said with a smile.

"All living beings are slaves of capital. There is no essential difference between us and these slave owners. It's just that we are more hypocritical and better at disguising ourselves. We use gold and silver to replace the dazzling shackles on these black slaves. Those workers wear them themselves. You have to thank us for being shackled.”

Whether it is slavery, feudalism or capitalism, there are only two classes: the exploiting class and the exploited class.

"You read a lot of foreign books, drink a lot of foreign ink, and talk a lot of fallacies. I can't explain you."

Liang Shaoqiong turned pale and Liang Yao turned around and leaned on the fur chair and took a nap, pretending to be asleep.

Liang Yao compared him to slave owners, and Liang Shaoqiong felt a little unhappy. After all, he was a person who had read books about sages, so how could he be the same kind of person as these slave owners? But he couldn't argue with Liang Yao.

Are the coal mines of the Liang family in Guangfu the same thing as these plantations? Those workers were hired by themselves with real money.

Thinking of the real money spent, Liang Shaoqiong couldn't help but feel a little sick and felt stupid.

Why hire people to mine?

If you go to Jiangnan to capture some long-haired rebels, or go to Nanyang to capture some natives, wouldn't it be more cost-effective to spend some money to buy some Japanese from Deng Yan?

Thinking of this, Liang Shaoqiong couldn't help but feel his heart tremble.

Shen Baozhen on the side suddenly became enlightened, but he had more questions in his mind: "Xiandi just said that economic activities have two ends, in addition to the production end, there is also the consumption end.

Slaves without wages are certainly unable to consume the products produced. Without enough people consuming the products, factory owners, or what Xiandi calls capitalists, cannot make a profit.

Therefore, looking at both ends of economic activities, this system is not perfect and seems difficult to operate in the long term. "

“Indeed, a healthy economy must take into account both the production and consumption ends, otherwise the internal cycle cannot be completed.

The issue you mentioned is not something that slave owners in the South should worry about. They are only responsible for producing raw materials. Most of the raw materials produced in the south of the United States are sold to the European continent, but only a few are sold to the north, so this system can be maintained to this day. "Liang Yao said.

The United States today is not a normal and healthy economy. Looking at the economic phenomenon of the United States with ordinary eyes is like looking at a blackboard with short-sighted eyes. It will only become blurrier and blurrier.

"The production end and the consumer end are almost separated, and the consumer end is far away in Europe and not in the mainland," Shen Baozhen said, "In this way, I seem to understand why there is discord between the north and the south of the United States.

Dear brother, I want to understand the economy of Western countries. Is there any book on this subject? "

After this trip, Shen Baozhen became more interested in the situation in Western countries.

The Western countries were not only far superior to the Qing Dynasty in terms of warships and guns, but their systems were also completely different from the Qing Dynasty. This aroused Shen Baozhen's curiosity and thirst for knowledge.

"Brother Shen thinks so highly of me. I'm just a businessman, not an economics professor. How can I have such works?" Liang Yao picked up "Principles of Political Economy and Taxation" on the table and took out the pen on his chest. Write a list of books on the title page.

"If Brother Shen is interested in the economies of Western countries, you can follow this list and go to my library to pick up these books and study them carefully when you return home."

Shen Baozhen took Liang Yao's book as if he had found a treasure, looked at the book list on the title page, flipped through it briefly, and said with a smile: "It seems that I should also bring an English teacher to teach me English."